Читать книгу The Silent Call - Edwin Milton Royle - Страница 4

CHAPTER IV

The French explorers and trappers called them medicine-men (médecins), but it isn't a comprehensive term. The medicine-man is something more than an Indian doctor. He is prophet, preacher, teacher, poet, and priest as well as healer. Before the coming of the missionaries the Indian had become aware of the world within and the world without, and, like every sentient creature, had begun to speculate on their relations and grope his way toward the eternal mysteries. He arrived at a confused intuition of a Supreme Being and he reasoned that everything came from this source, that each bird and beast, each river and tree, had some measure of the divine power and that this could be imparted, and so, when he was puzzled before the ever-renewing miracle of life or helpless before his own life problem, he did as holy men have done in all ages, he went apart into the solitudes, into the mountains or the deserts, and sought in contemplation, in purification, in fasting and prayer to find out God. He prayed and God sent the bear, the wolf, the eagle, the coyote, the thunder to give him strength or wisdom or courage. He became a dreamer and an interpreter of dreams, and from his comparison of the seen with the unseen have come some dignified and poetic concepts. For example, the Milky-Way became for him "the pathway of departed spirits." He invented song and story, myth and miracle, and symbolism dominated his life. Like all who have tried to rise out of the world of matter into the realm of mind, his holy men claimed to find exalted powers and metaphysical forces. He believed as we do in the healing virtues of plants and herbs, and when these failed he, too, resorted to spiritual healing. We are always intolerant of what we do not understand. We know now that the ghost-dance was nothing more than a religious revival with characteristic hysterical phenomena, and in intention was to usher in not war but universal peace. The victims of the Wounded Knee massacre were religious martyrs. The troops might as well have fired on a Methodist camp-meeting. Underneath the skin we are very much alike. We all travel the same road, only we differ in the mile-stones we have passed in the age-long journey.

Appah was a medicine-man. Whether he was a fair sample of the class I am not prepared to say. Even medicine-men differ in character and sincerity. Only Infinite Wisdom knows to what extent we are self-deceived. What happened at the sun-dance will give you some idea of Appah's position with his people and his relation to the principal characters of our story. All our Indians are more or less sun-worshippers. The sun is to them the most obvious power in the physical world. The sun-dance, to honor the sun or propitiate the sun, is held every year in the early days of July. The Indians will tell you "it's just for good time, same as white people," but it is in reality a religious ceremonial. Two or three miles below the Agency is a flat meadow where the dances are held. This is marked here and there by the medicine poles of former dances. These medicine poles are left standing and a new one cut from the mountains each year. It has a crotch at the top into which a bundle of sage-brush and some eagle feathers are tied. It is planted and raised with ceremonial, reverent and joyous. From it as a centre radiate poles to a circular enclosure made of young cottonwood and cedar trees planted with their foliage on. Inside, on the west of the big lodge, are little booths, sheltered, where the dancers rest when not dancing. The dance begins about seven o'clock at night, just as the sun has gone down. Those who are to participate appear on the plain in single file, blowing on a whistle made of the quill of an eagle's feather, and they keep this in their mouths all the time they are dancing, and its sharp, staccato note dominates the chant and the drum. The dancers are naked to the waist; in fact, have on nothing but breech-clouts and a loin cloth which is elaborately ornamented and falls to the feet before and behind. They have the down feather of the eagle tied to one finger on each hand, and some of the braves wear their rich glossy hair loose like a woman's. The forty-six dancers circled the dance lodge three times and then entered. After that the general public were admitted. As each buck stood before the little booth which was to be his home until the dance was finished it made a striking and beautiful picture.

Bare to the waist, the term "redskin" was justified, though some had obscured the natural beauty of their skins with a white, green, or yellow smear. On the whole they were a fine-looking body of men, though some of them were in the prayer dance with the hope of being cured of various ailments, rheumatism, tuberculosis, and the like.

The old cruelties, the lacerations, etc., have been eliminated, but it is still an endurance test. They dance for four or five days and nights without food or drink, and at high noon they look into the terrible sun. The dance itself is a perpetual strain on the same muscles—the feet held together, hopping forward and hopping back. The women have no part in the ceremonial except to join in the chant, though presumably their presence is not unknown to some of the participants, in spite of their rapt gaze being always turned to the medicine pole or to the sun. In fact, it is understood that some are "dancing for a wife."

The dance had been opened by Appah in very much the same way that we open a prayer-meeting. He advanced to the eastern side of the medicine pole and with his hands together at the waist, and the emphasis of small gestures or movements with the fingers, head reverently bowed, and in a tone inaudible three feet away had uttered a brief invocation. The others could not have heard him, but at his conclusion they clapped their hands together and uttered grunts of approval.

The drummers began to beat the tomtom furiously and swung into their monotonous chant, and the dance was on. The whites and half-breeds stood or sat about the entrance on the north. Appah, having started the dance, remained in front of his booth for some time, waiting for the spirit to move him; suddenly his face set and he moved out to the medicine pole with the wing of an eagle in his hand. He dipped the tip of this in the dust at the foot of the pole, then touched the top of his head, then ran it down each arm, then down each leg, then he held it up dramatically to the east. Just then the cool fragrant air of the night was broken by a laugh—a glad, buoyant, girlish laugh. It would be difficult to describe the shock of this incongruity. Almost without turning to see, every one knew that it came from Wah-na-gi. She was dressed in a neat pink cotton frock with the white of her bodice showing in the neck and sleeves and a pink ribbon in her hair. She had not been back long from school, and she was still very young, took the sun or the shade quickly like a mountain lake, and she could still laugh easily. Appah stopped, turned ashen with anger, saw who it was, and saw who stood behind her—Calthorpe, the chief of Indian police. He saw Calthorpe with a look of dull ferocity and, strange to say, he saw Wah-na-gi for the first time in a new light. He had heard the talk about her since she had returned from the school at Carlisle, but hitherto she had escaped his notice. Now he could have strangled her, and at the same time he was acutely aware that she was pretty, indeed beautiful. He unconsciously excused her in some half-instinctive way and held Calthorpe responsible for the insult. In a measure he was right; it was the latter's remark which made the girl laugh, but that remark was not directed at Appah. The latter did not know that behind him had hopped into view—Tonkawa, a fat, vain little man with a grotesque body set on a pair of grotesque legs. The movement of the dance threw Tonkawa's superfluous flesh about in a most ridiculous way. Calthorpe had whispered to Wah-na-gi:

"Look at Tonkawa! He's a prairie dog." Indeed, he looked so like a prairie dog, Wah-na-gi giggled. Calthorpe continued: "He's dancing for a wife."

Even Calthorpe did not expect the peal of laughter that followed, but he was the first to recover his presence of mind, and before the general indignation could take form he carried her from the enclosure. Appah was so preoccupied with the unpleasant incident that he turned his back on the medicine pole and walked back to his booth. Both these proceedings were bad luck, and were noted by his followers, and he was angrily aware of them himself when it was too late. It was a bad beginning. Every one felt it. When at midnight the watch-fire was lighted, the air got very still and hot, unusual in this country, for the nights are cool, and after an interval of suffocating calm, filled with forebodings, a terrific wind-storm sprang out of the night and filled the air with a hot, blinding, choking desert dust. Then, indeed, gloom gathered over the mystic circle and fear and depression invaded each heart.

Appah was conscious, too, that in an unacknowledged way he would be held responsible for these misfortunes, so, smarting with a sense of personal insult, raging against the crowding omens of ill, he redoubled his energy, danced often and with a fierce energy that soon wore itself out, and still the tempest blew on. It blew through the night, it blew through the next day. It looked as if the dance would have to be abandoned. Appah was showing signs of distress. He advanced as usual to the medicine pole and, appearing to be about to faint, he threw out his hands and grasped it, steadied himself like a tired pugilist who hugs and hangs on to his opponent, then, when he had recovered sufficiently, he went through various signs and passes, "making medicine." He continued this until he could stand, then he boldly stood out and addressed his companions.

The Wind-Gods were angry; they were tearing up the earth and throwing it in their faces. Something was wrong. Indian women were turning into white women; they went away from their people, went to school and then came back and laughed at their elders, laughed at the sacred mysteries. Shinob (the God-mystery) was sorry, ashamed of his Indian children. Everything was all wrong. Appah was a big medicine-man, a wise man, knowing many things. He had done much for his people and God was angry to have his servant mocked. It would be bad medicine to abandon the dance; great sorrow and trouble would come of it. Their friends had come from afar to see it; a great feast was to follow, and those who had danced were to have the joy of giving away many gifts to these friends. The dance must go on, while he went apart and made medicine. He would go into the mountains and consult the thunder-bird and in the morning come back and drive away the wind. And with as much dignity as he could command, he walked out of the corral.

The news of this promise spread rapidly, and the following day the corral was crowded with Indians and whites, all to see whether Appah could "make good." The morning wore away and still he did not appear, but when people had begun to smile, he walked into the dance like a man in a trance. A hush fell upon all. He carried an eagle feather in his hand, and with this made medicine. First he faced the north, rubbed the wrist of his left hand with the feather, then, with a simultaneous movement of both hands, threw off the evil spell. This he did to the east, south, and west. Then all the Indians got up and shook their blankets, and—the WIND DIED! It went out like a candle. You may explain this as you like. Appah may have been lucky in choosing the moment when the wind would have died anyway, or you may say that the skeptical whites who saw this were hypnotized just as the Indians were. That Appah would not hesitate to resort to any trick to impress his followers, I do not deny, but it is certain also that he believed in himself and in his esoteric powers. However you explain it, it was conceded among the whites that it was a sporty thing to do, to stake his professional reputation on a throw like that, and great was the fame of Appah in the land. One result which may interest us was that Appah who had already been the unhappy possessor of two wives, showed an unmistakable desire to take a third, and it was the woman who laughed!

CHAPTER V

Wah-na-gi was about to mount the steps of the trader's store when Appah, who had followed her without her being aware of it, abruptly confronted her and put out his hand as if he would speak to her. As she shrank back startled, Calthorpe, who had likewise followed her, stepped in between the two. With a swift glance at the latter she slipped past Appah and entered the store. It all happened in a moment, but it was one of those moments in which all pretence, all appearances, all conventional restraints slip from the soul and leave it naked, knowing and being known.

"Hello, Appah, you look as if you had swallowed a hair rope. What is it?"

And the young chief of police smiled provokingly into the glowering face of the medicine-man. It was war. The two men knew it: the woman knew it, and Ladd, who had just stepped from his house opposite, knew it.

"Wait a minute, you two," he said in a firm, quiet tone that implied acquiescence. "Better leave this to me."

"I understood that Appah was looking for me," drawled the youngster insolently, then he turned and looked squarely into the glittering eyes of the Indian.

"Always at home to my friends, old chap, only"—and he removed his hat and ran a finger through the hole in it—-"don't send up your card; just come yourself."

If Appah knew what was meant, not a quiver of an eyelash betrayed it. There was an obvious pause, then Calthorpe added in a patronizing tone not lost on his enemy:

"A rotten bad shot by the way; it doesn't do you credit." Nothing hurts the Indian like ridicule. Most of us are vulnerable. Poor Achilles! What a pitiful weakness for a warrior—in the heel! Perhaps the story is intended to convey the impression that some one laughed at Achilles' feet and he died. The deaths we die from ridicule! Lingering and conscious! We arm ourselves with contempt for others, but alas for the Achilles spot. Centuries of cultivated philosophy do not protect us. Only love, that love which looks past time into eternity, arms us against the sting of ridicule.

Poor Appah! The woman had laughed at him, and now the man! He did not attempt to reply in kind.

"Maybe so Injin," he said with a movement of the hand toward the store where Wah-na-gi had disappeared.

After a dignified pause during which he looked from one to the other to make sure they knew what he meant, he continued:

"White woman,—white man! Injin woman,—Injin man! You savey—wayno (good). No savey,—heap trouble, plenty trouble!" Seeing that he was understood, he moved away with great dignity.

"That seems to cover the ground, doesn't it?" said the agent pleasantly. "White women are for white men; Indian women are for Indian men, and the man who thinks differently will get into trouble."

"There's a bad boy, if you like," said the young man indifferently, ignoring the insinuation of the other and lounging lazily against the store platform. "He's a naughty boy."

"Yes," said the agent, as he offered his cigarettes to the other and with a lithe spring seated himself beside him. "Look out for him. He's a bit peevish over your attentions to Wah-na-gi."

"Attentions?"

"Call it what you like," said the agent, aware of the irritation of the other's inflection. "You're not going to get any quarrel out of me over an Indian woman."

This frank contempt, including as it did Wah-na-gi, produced a very disagreeable impression upon Hal, but he restrained himself to say quietly:

"I've been wanting to speak to you about that—about her, I mean. You ought to protect her, this Indian girl." He was annoyed to find he was speaking as if he were confused.

"You seem to be making a special feature of that—yourself, Calthorpe."

This was like a blow and Hal flushed with anger, but he was conscious that he was in some way at a disadvantage and so he controlled himself to say coldly:

"I'm your chief of police."

"Has she complained?"

"Yes."

"To you?"

"Yes, but leaving her out of the question, you ought to hobble Appah or let me hobble him."

"Oh, I think he knows I'm agent."

"You let him play a free hand."

"Do I? What do you mean?"

"The last time I arrested him you let him go."

"Appah is a difficult person, very cunning, very influential. He would have posed as a martyr. The cowboys were the aggressors."

"They were," said Calthorpe, "but you leave them to me. I'll keep them and their cattle off the Reservation, if I'm not interfered with. Appah steals their cattle; they steal back, only, two for one. Somebody gets hurt and then the settlers yell 'Murder'; there's a call for the troops, there's an Indian war, and the rest of these poor people suffer."

"Why, my dear boy," said the agent, laughing, "we couldn't get on without men like Appah. They divert attention and raise a useful dust."

Hal had no illusions about the agent, but the brutal cynicism of this left him for the moment without a reply. He had a picture of thugs picking a quarrel with a stranger in order to assault him, beat him to death, and rob him.

Ladd had spoken rather plainly. He meant to be even plainer.

"Let's talk about something more important," he said with amusement at the other's blank expression. "Yourself, for instance."

"Myself?"

"Yes, I've taken a fancy to you, my boy, and I want to see you get on. In this country it's etiquette never to ask a man where he comes from or if that's his real name. I've heard it set down to our native delicacy and finer feeling, but I reckon it comes from the fact that most people who come out here couldn't stay at home. For instance, I don't suppose that Calthorpe is your——"

"My real name? No, you are quite right; it isn't."

He said this with almost boyish frankness. Ladd chuckled at his own shrewdness and felt completely master of the game.

"What does it matter so long as I do my duty and give satisfaction—and I have done that, haven't I?"

"You certainly have," said the other with a cordiality that was meant to be disarming and ingratiating. "You have brought the police force to the highest state of efficiency, and your men—well, they would stand the torture test for you. And it isn't the first time you've had men under your command either," he added with a knowing smile.

"No," said the other simply.

"In fact you've been a soldier."

"Right."

"A British soldier, I fancy."

"Right again."

"You left the service——"

Ladd paused for effect like a police court lawyer, who was having fun with a helpless witness.

"You left the service—well, let us say, for good and sufficient reasons."

"Because I couldn't stay, if that's what you mean. Well, what of it?"

"Why, only this, that I think you and I might be useful to each other, that's all. Now, about this asphalt."

Ladd's voice dropped to a confidential key and slipped into a tone that was intended to chloroform his victim.

"I happen to know that the Asphalt Trust could make use of these lands. At present McShay and his cowboys are in forcible possession, but they can't hold 'em. If the Trust can't get the lands any other way, they'll fight these people in and out of the courts, in and out of the legislature, in and out of congress, in and out of the cabinet, until they wear them out, until the cowboys get tired fighting and spending money, and are glad to sell out for a song. The Trust will get the lands in some way and sooner or later, you can stake your life on it."

Hal was listening with great intentness and Ladd's voice showed that he felt on surer ground.

"Now, we'd like to feel that you were friendly to us, that your interests were identical with ours; we think we can show you that they are identical, and, under any circumstances, we want to feel sure that your knowledge of the Reservation and the country in dispute is not at the disposal of our enemies, the McShay crowd. And oh, by the by, just as a precaution against trouble, during this conference this afternoon, instruct your police to be out of sight, but near at hand, and ready to obey orders. And understand this, that any arrangement we may make with you now will only be a beginning—just an evidence of good-will. Come on into the house and let's fix it up."

Ladd started for the house and turned his head to see if Hal was following him. The latter seemed in a daze. That seemed very natural and very encouraging to the agent. Just at that moment Wah-na-gi appeared in the door of the store. Ladd saw her, beckoned to Hal, and played his trump card.

"And as for Appah and this Indian girl—well, stand in with us and you shall have a free hand. Savey? Come on. Let's get together." And Hal followed the agent into his house.

CHAPTER VI

"I'm in a hurry."

Wah-na-gi spoke before Appah had uttered a word. The latter had waited and again confronted the Indian girl as she was leaving the trader's store. She looked for a way to escape and saw none. As for Appah, he cherished no illusions as to his chances. He realized that he must exercise all his resources to win against the young chief of police, but that knowledge only made him the more determined. He was a tall, muscular man, of great natural dignity, very proud. As a lad he had gone to school for a while and progressed rapidly, especially on the foot-ball field, where he gave promise of developing into one of the greatest half-backs ever seen on the gridiron, but he resented restraint, was easily offended, and suddenly left the school, made his way back to the Agency, taking back with him a cordial hatred of the white man and everything connected with him. A swift survey of the situation convinced him that the easiest way to influence and preferment among his own people was to become more Indian than the Indian, so he resumed the blanket, and with it he became the representative of the old order of things. He understood English perfectly, but pretended not to, and he could speak English fairly well, but he loathed it, and affected to speak it with great difficulty, after the manner of the elders who had never learned and did not want to learn.

He had a finely chiselled face in which the ascetic seemed to be struggling with the voluptuary. It is a not impossible combination. He looked at Wah-na-gi now in a kindly way and spoke reassuringly, as one would speak to a child.

"Touge wayno teguin."

She did not hear him. She was thinking of some one else, of many things, and she was frightened. Then to meet her more than half-way, to show that he could be even indulgent to her prejudices, he translated.

"Heap good friend, me!"

She did not hear.

"Maybe so we talk Injin talk. White man talk no good. All lies, plenty lies, lies all time!"

At last she heard, but she did not look at him as she said:

"No, I won't talk Injin talk. I won't go back and be like you and like them. It's no use for you to try to make me. I can't. It's too late."

It was a curious contrast, these two. They were very far apart, at the two extremes, each going to exaggerated and unreasonable lengths, the one to go back, the other to go on. It was very childish. Appah felt this and, feeling the stronger, made the concession. "Fish—water! Bird—air! Half bird, half fish—no good! Injin face, Injin name, white heart!—no good! White man no savey you; Injin no savey you. Maybe so you come back—be Injin! Wayno!" He looked very well as he said this, for he was very much in earnest and he threw into it all his natural eloquence of voice and gesture.

"It's too late," she said sadly. "I couldn't go back."

There was a pause as she looked over to the agent's house and added:

"Not now."

Appah saw and understood.

"Alone, you! Heap alone! All time alone!"

"Yes," she said with the suspicion of a sob in her voice. "I am alone."

Appah was on his way to the dances in the meadows, not the sun-dance, but the social functions, the turkey, wolf, buffalo dances, and he was dressed in all the glory of feather bonnet, buckskin shirt, and was conscious of looking extremely well. He was a vain man and it was difficult for him to realize that he had not produced a favorable impression, so he made the mistake of calling attention to his advantages.

"My father—big chief—Big Thunder. Big chief—me! Big medicine-man! Heap savey, me! Heap savey Shinob, heap savey—mystery! The bear, my friend, give me his strength! the wolf, he heap savey me! The wind talk to me! the sun, my friend! Plenty cattle, plenty horses! Maybeso you be Appah's squaw."

As Appah finished his eloquent appeal, two of Calthorpe's police lounged into sight from nowhere in particular. The sight of them made the medicine-man angry.

"Pikeway," he said to them. Which means "go away," "get along," and "get out," or just "go," according to the way you say it. It meant several things the way Appah said it. The two men only came nearer and were provokingly oblivious of the big chief. It was plain that they did not intend to hear him. Appah turned to her and, doubly irritated at being disregarded before her, said:

"Injin police—bad medicine! Trail, trail! me! all time, follow me! Tishum, tishum (all time)! Maybeso make heap trouble! You tell 'em pikeway."

"No, I will not," said Wah-na-gi boldly, plucking up courage in their presence.

"I'm afraid of you."

Then Appah forgot that he was trying to win her love. He advanced close to her, as if he would lay violent hands on her.

"Maybeso you heap like 'em white man. I savey you! Chief Injin police, eh? Katch wayno! (No good). Maybeso kill 'im some day!"

Then he noticed that she was dressed very neatly, better than the Indian women dress, that in fact she had on her best clothes, and he knew it was because the chief of police had just got back, and it enraged him to violence. He snatched the string of beads from her neck and threw them to the ground.

He snatched the string of beads from her neck.

"Kill 'im, me, some day."

"Who's that you're going to kill?" said Calthorpe in his soft musical voice as he advanced from the porch of the agent's house. Appah turned on him in a fury.

"What's matter you?"

He pointed to the two policemen.

"Your dog, savey? I look down—saw-reach! (dog). Look back—saw-reach! This side, that side—saw-reach, Injin police! Maybeso you can't do it. Maybeso make heap trouble!"

"You savey this woman?" said Hal quietly. "Her people, dead! No father, no mother! heap bad men all around, plenty bad men, some whites, some Injin. You leave her alone. Savey?"

Unconsciously the white people speak English to the Indians as the Indians speak it, as we talk baby-talk to a baby.

"Maybeso you too all time pretty quick leave Injin woman alone."

Appah's hand was feeling under his blanket for his knife.

"When I speak with this woman," replied Hal simply, "some of these Indian men are always near. She is not to be troubled—not by you, not by me! Chavanaugh, come here."

One of the policemen came forward.

"If anything bad, any harm, comes to this woman through me, these men will kill me. These are my orders; is it so?"

"Toyoch, wayno," replied Chavanaugh slowly. "It is so and it is well."

"Now for you," said Hal to the medicine-man.

"You quit running off the settlers' cattle or I'll arrest you."

"Maybeso you can't, medicine-man, me! Chief, heap big chief!" Hal ignored this boast.

"This woman heap scared, all time scared! Let her alone!"

Appah made a long pause before he replied, then he said with some thing that approached a smile:

"Maybeso yes—maybeso no," and he walked to his pony hitched before the blacksmith shop and rode away.

Up to this time Wah-na-gi had remained alert, proud, outwardly calm; now she seemed to dwindle and shrink as she weakly drifted to some empty boxes which huddled under a cottonwood tree by the side of the little irrigating ditch which brawled along in a joyous hurry to get to the big streams below.

Calthorpe followed her and as she sat down said gently: "You are very tired."

"No," she said; "I am not tired."

"What is it, Wah-na-gi?"

It was a musical name as he uttered it.

"Is it Appah?"

She made a movement with the shoulders, and a half, unfinished, suggested movement of the hands; it indicated weariness and contempt.

"No, he frightens me, but it isn't that. It's me. Appah is right. I'm half bird, half fish, and I can't fly and I can't swim. I flop around on the earth and gasp for breath. And I know it, and I can't make it different."

Her lip curled bitterly but he did not try to console her with feeble platitudes. It was a great relief to her to speak to one who knew, and she was grateful for his silence. He simply sat down beside her and she felt that he was sorry and would like to help her.

"I suppose I was always impossible, even as a child. My parents gave me another name, but no one ever called me by it. Wah-na-gi is a nickname. It means 'the spirit when separated from the body.'[1] You see, even as a child I must have been strange and different."

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[1] A Dakota word.

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"It's a very beautiful name," he said softly; "the most beautiful name I ever heard. I'm glad they gave it to you."

Though he struggled to control his voice and make what he said very simple and commonplace, his tone was a caress. It seemed to take her by the hand and lead her through the gardens of life and bring her to the gates of Paradise.

It was very terrible for her to be so conscious of misery and so near to happiness. Tears sprang to her eyes; she trembled, she bit her lip and struggled, struggled audibly to control herself, to keep to the earth, to get back to the reality.

"Why did they do it?" she sobbed. "Oh, why did they do it?"

"They?" he said gently, groping, groping in his mind for some way to help her.

"My parents and the old chief Tabywana. No, I must not speak bitterly of them. They're dead now, and they meant well. They meant well. They thought they were doing great things for me—for me. Oh! Oh!" As a realization of her position swept over her again, her hands closed convulsively and she moaned as if in physical pain. It was the first time she had talked to any one about herself since she had returned from school. She was suffering it all over again, but it was a great relief to share it with some one. She was calmer now as she continued:

"They thought it was a great thing for me to go away to the Government school. They must have been dreamers too. They were very proud of me and thought I was so wonderful. Parents will think that sometimes about their children," she added wisely.

He smiled as he thought to himself:

"What a child she is! She'll always be a child."

"They thought I would learn all the wonderful things the white people knew, and I was very young; I thought so too. And the teachers—they were so kind. They petted and spoiled me because I learned faster than the rest. A new world opened to me, and I saw that there was nothing very mysterious about the white man's way, that it lay open to me, a poor Indian girl, and then I began to dream, and I forgot everything but my dream, and I worked, oh so hard; and I was happy, happier than I can tell you. Soon no one would have known that I was an Indian, except that I looked like an Indian, and I was not ashamed of that. And no labor, no sacrifice was too great, for I had great thoughts. I said to myself: 'Some day I will gather up all these blessings and take them home, back to the mountains, back to my own people, and perhaps God, the Great Spirit, will let me take them by the hand, these poor, ignorant, helpless children, and lead them out of bondage.'"

She paused for a moment and her face lit up with the glory of this dream whose sun had set.

"And I hoped that perhaps I could teach them to protect themselves against the white man, his cunning, cruelty, and vices. I saw it all so clearly myself, I felt that I could make them see it. And so, walking on the air, my head in the clouds, I came back with my dream. I came back with both hands stretched out to my people, and then——"

She paused, the sunset glow of a departed dream was gone, and in her face gathered the shadows of the long night that followed. It was such a relief to find expression that she was not conscious that she was laying bare her soul before this man, and he was conscious only of the fact that he was living her life with her, and it made him strangely, sadly happy. She had paused before the recollection of her home-coming and she was grateful to him that he did not try to comfort or console her.

"And then?" he suggested gently.

"I can't tell it, I can't," she sobbed; then with an effort she steadied herself and shook the tears out of her voice and went bravely on:

"The surprise, the shock, the pain as I began to realize the truth. I can't tell it, I can't explain it. I didn't try much at first, just example. I tried to live before them, to let them see the other way, the better way. The women saw me wash my face and hands always before eating, my teeth too. I tried to show them in my dress, my habits, my manner, but instead of seeing that what I was doing or trying to do was better, they only saw that it was different, and they hated me for it. They thought that I felt I was better than they were, and I couldn't make them see that I had only love for them in my heart. They would say: 'Here she comes, the white woman; make room for her; give her the best seat; she knows everything; we are nothing but poor Indians, but she has been to school; listen carefully to what she has to say. She is very young but she will teach us all.' I believe I could stand torture, but I can't bear to be made fun of. Perhaps they didn't mean to do more than tease me, but they tortured me. They hurt me cruelly and I could not hide it. They saw this and it seemed to make them happy, so every one took a hand in the new game. They called me the White Squaw. They praised me, they praised everything I did. It was great sport—for them. Finally the chiefs, the elders, took me aside, and talked to me of my effort to change things. The women must look to the men of the tribe; it wasn't wise to attempt new and strange things; it wasn't womanly; it was foolish for me to meddle in matters beyond me. This was more terrible because they were trying to be kind to me. They advised me to marry. Appah had asked for me and Colorow, the head chief, had given his consent. I began to see that it was hopeless. I was not an Indian to the Indians nor a white woman to the whites. I tried to forget, to go back, to be like them, and then you came, and I knew that I couldn't."

She said this simply, quite as a matter of course. Indeed, she was quite unconscious of what this meant to him.

"The worst of it all is they won't let me teach their children." She tried to say this bravely, but her voice broke in a sob.

"No?" he said with deep concern, for he knew that her hope lay in the children, that her heart was in her work as a teacher, and that her cramped, starved soul had found meat and drink in her love for the little ones.

"No. Yesterday the agent asked me to resign my position! He said that if I didn't the Indians would withdraw their children from the school."

Hal did not reply to this. All his faculties were alive and in a flash he saw the situation. He said nothing. What could he say?

She was not only face to face with a big, implacable problem but with a very painful and sordid struggle for existence.

"No, I could not go back," she repeated. "Whatever happens I will never again be like them. They make me shudder. I have no people, no kindred, no country. I am an outcast. Sometimes I get frightened. I seem to be just an empty shadow. I feel dead, but I still walk about. I can't even lie down under the ground and rest like my parents who are gone. I don't know why I tell you all this. You are a white man. You cannot understand."

"Wah-na-gi, I understand. I understand even what you haven't said. I'm glad you told me all this, but I knew it before you told me." And he smiled at her tenderly and she smiled back at him through her tears.

"You are very wonderful," she said with divine candor, and he laughed joyously, because he knew she was incapable of sarcasm.

"No Wah-na-gi, I'm not wonderful. I'm a very ordinary chap. It would be strange if I didn't understand. My mother, too, was an Indian woman."

He thought she would be startled, and he watched her narrowly for a sign. Would she be disappointed? Would her hero crumble? Or would she be glad that they were closer to each other than she had dreamed?

"Your mother?" she said. She did not grasp it. She hadn't thought to speculate about him; to wonder who he was or where he came from or why he was there.

"Your mother! Did you say your mother was an——"

"An Indian woman. Nat-u-ritch was her name.

"Nat-u-ritch? No, it isn't possible. The pretty little woman—they say she was so pretty—who, who——"

He said it for her.

"Killed herself over at the Red Butte Ranch? Yes, the same. She was my mother."

"I see now," she said. "Otherwise it couldn't have been. I couldn't have told you, and you, you never would have understood. I'm so glad you told me."

And without stopping to inquire why, the world seemed a different world, almost possible, perhaps a world in which one would be willing to live, might even be happy. Such small things sometimes make this curious old world.

"It was Fate, Wah-na-gi," he said irrelevantly. "It had to be. It is always like that. Things are so. That's all. We come together, you and I, because we are alone, alone in a big world."

"You, too," she said incredulously. Was it possible that this superior being could have been treated by life with the same want of consideration shown to a poor Indian girl? "Alone? You?" she repeated. It was a joy to find that they had many things in common, even if they were sorrows.

"Yes, I, too, am an outcast."

He said it lightly, because he was not begging for sympathy, for he no longer felt in need of sympathy. Indeed, he no longer felt an outcast. He said it because he wanted to make one more tie between them.

"You? Oh, no, it couldn't be!" she said, and her soul went out to meet him and stood waiting. He saw it but he did not realize all it meant to him.

"Yes," he said reassuringly.

"I pitied myself once, but I don't now. It was all for the best. Otherwise I wouldn't be here. Yes, I had to get out, had to leave England, had to leave the British Army."

"You were a soldier. Of course, I ought to have known that," she said with frank admiration.

"I could tell you a fancy story," he said; "and you'd believe it, but I'd rather you knew the truth. Lies always keep one dodging. They said I disobeyed orders."

"But it wasn't true," she said with quiet conviction.

"Yes," he replied, grateful to her nevertheless. "Yes, it was true. Yes, I disobeyed orders. They were fool orders; they were crazy, cowardly, panicky orders and I disobeyed them, and I dare say I'd do it again if I had the chance."

He said this with more heat than she had ever seen him display, and she was proud and happy because she saw no sense of shame in his face and felt no reservation in the ringing tones of his voice.

"It was in South Africa. I was ordered to retreat. I tore up the despatch and ordered my men to charge, and I'm not bragging when I say I saved the division from annihilation."

"And they punished you for that?"

"Well, you see, it was like this—I don't know whether you'll understand it exactly, but this wasn't done in a corner. It was plain that if I was right our commander was—well—deserved to be court-martialled. He was a great man with the highest social and political connections. The people behind him couldn't afford to be shadowed by his disgrace. In fact, if they let the truth out it would have become a national scandal. It was easier to ask for the resignation of a youngster whom nobody knew, and about whom nobody cared, nobody but my poor old Dad. Even those who knew the truth said I was a fighter not a soldier, that I didn't know how to obey, was insolent and insubordinate, and they bawled that the Empire needed soldiers not heroes. They said I jeopardized the Empire in order to make a reputation for myself. They said a lot of things. The only man who stood by me—God bless him!—was my immediate superior, and he had to resign too, for telling the truth. So I was sacrificed. I had to give up the only career for which I was fitted, the only thing I cared for, and every door in England was shut to me forever. You see I have no people or country either."

"You shall have mine," she said quickly.

"You forget, you haven't any," he rejoined, and they both laughed like happy children.

Ladd had stood for a moment on his veranda and watched them with a cynical smile. They felt the chill of his shadow even before he spoke.

"Have you instructed your men as I told you?" he asked of Calthorpe as he came toward them.

"No," said the young man rising, "but I will."

He signalled to his two men to follow him and he walked away.

"Come," he said to her; "I'll walk a little of the way with you."

"Don't go far," said the agent. "The meeting will take place at once and I depend on you."

As they walked along neither spoke. Both of them had looked forward to this moment many times; both had dreaded it; both had avoided it; both had conspired to postpone it, and now they were face to face with it. Something strange had come into their lives, born of complete understanding. To help him to go away, to urge him to go away, at first seemed to her impossible, now it was imperative.

"You must go away," she said simply, as if they had been talking of it for a long time. "Your life isn't safe here."

This conveyed no meaning to him now. There were other reasons. He was well aware of them. He had in fact laid awake many a night answering them and confusing them, smothering them. His inclinations had silenced them many times. Now he knew that it was inevitable and could no longer be postponed, and yet, what of her? He saw that she had some basketwork and beadwork in her hands; that she had been into the store to try to sell them; that she had not done so. The trader sells these things for very good prices, but he takes care not to pay anything for them. He knew that Appah had been instrumental in having her dismissed from her position in the school, in the expectation that it might help to drive her to the protection and shelter of his home; that this had been done with the connivance of Ladd. He realized that her dismissal would be popular! He thought, too, that he could, if he chose, have her restored to her position, which meant more, much more to her than the salary involved; and that this was part of the "valuable consideration" intended by the agent. He knew that never had she so much need of him as now, and he must go away. "Your life isn't safe here," she repeated, seeing that he had not heard.

"Oh," he said, laughing, taking off his hat and looking at the hole in it quizzically. "Somebody has told you. Oh, it was nothing. Some one was hunting and I happened in the way—that's all."

"It was Appah," she said with complete conviction.

"What if it was?" he said, unimpressed. "He knows I know."

"He's a bad man."

"Well, he isn't my idea of a good man exactly; still—there are worse men than Appah."

"Yes," she echoed with conviction; "the agent, and he doesn't trust you."

"No?" he said, genuinely surprised. "What makes you think so?"

"Last night I was sitting crouched behind an empty oil barrel below the trader's window. I was very discouraged, for I had not been able to sell any of my work, and I was trying to think of some other way, or some other work, and before I knew it or realized that I was listening I heard their voices, the trader and the agent. I couldn't hear it all, but I heard enough. It was how the trader could stand at the store window, pretend to be cleaning a gun, and kill some one outside."

"And you think they had me in mind?"

"I didn't hear your name, only—don't go to this meeting this afternoon."

"I must go, Wah-na-gi; I couldn't stay away; but don't you be worried."

"What is it about?"

"The asphalt lands."

"They are a lot of bad men. Don't go, please don't go."

"Why, bless your heart, little woman, I know all about them, and I can take care of myself. I'm as safe as if I were in a church."

"If you stay on the Agency—they will kill you. You must go away."

"What is it, Bill?" said Calthorpe as the big foreman hove in sight breathing heavily as if he had hurried.

"Ladd wants you; they're ready to begin."

"All right, Bill, I'll come at once."

As Bill hastened away Hal took from his vest pocket a small automatic magazine gun.

"Wah-na-gi," he said, "I bought this for you the last time I was in Denver." And he rapidly showed her its simple mechanism. "Learn to use it. You might need it some day, and if you don't, no harm done." And he dropped it in the beaded pouch that hung from her waist.